MCAT® ExamPsychological, Social, and Biological Foundations of BehaviorHard
A patient with damage to their Broca's area due to a stroke presents with a specific type of language deficit. They understand spoken and written language relatively well but struggle to produce fluent speech, often speaking in short, effortful phrases with many pauses and missing function words (e.g., 'Want food,' 'Go store'). This condition is best characterized as:
- AConduction aphasia
- BGlobal aphasia
- CWernicke's aphasia
- DBroca's aphasia
Show answer & explanationAnswer & explanation
Correct answer: D. Broca's aphasia
Broca's aphasia (also known as expressive or non-fluent aphasia) results from damage to Broca's area and is characterized by difficulty producing speech, despite relatively intact comprehension. The patient's struggle with fluent, grammatical speech, while retaining understanding, perfectly matches this description.
Why the other options are wrong
- A. Conduction aphasia involves difficulty repeating words but relatively good comprehension and fluent speech.
- B. Global aphasia involves severe impairment in both speech production and comprehension.
- C. Wernicke's aphasia (receptive/fluent aphasia) involves fluent but meaningless speech and poor comprehension.
Broca's Aphasia
A type of aphasia resulting from damage to Broca's area, characterized by difficulty with speech production (non-fluent speech) despite relatively intact language comprehension.
- Also known as expressive or non-fluent aphasia
- Speech is slow, effortful, and dysarthric
- Often involves agrammatism (missing function words)
- Comprehension is typically preserved, though complex sentences may be difficult
Memory trick: Broca's is broken speech, Wernicke's is wacky words.